Long Haul Hauntings: Frank Figliuzzi on Highway Serial Killers and the FBI's Critical Role

Join us as we unravel the chilling world of highway serial killers with Frank Figliuzzi, former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence, who exposes the terrifying secrets behind these crimes in his new book, "Long Haul Hunting the Highway Serial Killers." Discover how long-haul truckers exploit jurisdictional loopholes to evade law enforcement, making it one of the most challenging crime categories to solve. Frank’s firsthand experiences, including riding along with truckers and interviewing survivors, offer an unparalleled look into this alarming phenomenon.

Our discussion touches on the crucial role of the FBI's behavioral analysis unit and how their expertise aids in solving complex cases while providing essential support to local law enforcement. We address the subtle yet devastating nature of human trafficking, illustrating how education and awareness are pivotal in combatting this heinous crime. The episode also examines the psychological nuances of serial killers within the trucking industry, highlighting the intelligence and cunning that often allow them to remain undetected for prolonged periods.

Finally, we delve into the broader implications of defunding the FBI, shedding light on the agency's indispensable role in maintaining national security and public safety. Through Frank's insights, we explore the collaborative efforts between law enforcement and social service organizations to support trafficking victims and thwart traffickers. Tune in to understand the magnitude of the threats we face and the essential support the FBI provides in ensuring our communities remain safe and secure.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to the Jack Hopkins Show podcast, where stories about the power of focus and resilience are revealed by the people who live those stories and now the host of the Jack Hopkins Show podcast, jack Hopkins.

Speaker 2: 0:19

Okay, and welcome to the Jack Hopkins Show podcast. I'm your host, jack Hopkins. And welcome to the Jack Hopkins Show podcast. I'm your host, jack Hopkins, and today I am honored to have back with me for a second time Frank Figliuzzi Now Frank. I want to start off with this because this, for me, sets the frame for everything else. He's a former assistant director for counterintelligence at the FBI, and I say that because this isn't some hobbyist who decided you know, I'd like to write a book. Let me pick a topic and I'll study up on that and I'll write a book. Frank had well over 25 years in the FBI. He directed all espionage cases in the United States government. This is a guy that's been there and done that. So, frank, welcome to the show.

Speaker 3: 1:23

Thanks for having me again, jack. I enjoyed our last discussion and I I'm glad you know today we can not only have another discussion but maybe shed some light on a pretty dark area of our society, absolutely, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 1:37

You have a new book, and I say a new book because this is your second book, correct?

Speaker 3: 1:44

It is my second book, yep. The last one, about three years ago, was called the FBI Way Inside. The Bureau's Code of Excellence became a national bestseller. This one is very different?

Speaker 2: 1:54

Well, it is, and I have had the opportunity to lead this book Long Haul Hunting the Highway Serial Killers. Long Haul Hunting the Highway Serial Killers. I learned a lot of things from this book, frank, and I have to tell you, quite a few pages made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. What prompted you to pursue this topic, this path?

Speaker 3: 2:32

So there's an aspect of my personality that doesn't really like being in the dark and not knowing. It's, I think, what drew me to the FBI and helped me kind of move through the organization for 25 years. I'm an investigator at heart. I'm very curious, I'm a questioner of almost everything. And so when I heard post-retirement now Jack, people often think, oh, frank, you're writing about as you did with your first book, you're writing about something you worked, I was, I've supervised just about everything the FBI does at some point and worked much of it, but not this.

Speaker 3: 3:10

And so when I had a discussion with a woman who said, oh, I work at the FBI, and I said, what do you do there? And she goes oh, I head up the FBI Highway Serial Killings Initiative, I said okay, timeout, timeout. You got to tell me what's going on. Are you telling me this is still going on? And she just floored me with numbers. Numbers like 850 women known to be murdered alongside our nation's highways in the last few decades, 450 active suspects in the long-haul trucking community for 200 unsolved murders along the nation's highways, 25 long-haul truckers already in prison for multiple homicides, and that has not made a dent in the unsolved caseload. So these women are almost all sex trafficking victims.

Speaker 3: 4:06

And when I gave you know, I gave the FBI a chance to kind of be politically correct and say now hold on, you're not, you're not saying that all of these cases in your initiative are done by long haul truckers. And they said no, frank, that's, that's exactly what we're saying. That is the initiative. I was hard, so it's part of me to go. Okay, I know you can't tell me much more because these are all pending and they're really not the FBI's cases. They're local, state, county murders that you're helping with. So I'm going to figure this out on my own. This is something I need to find out and maybe even write about in a book.

Speaker 3: 4:46

And it turned out that's exactly what happened. I got my investigator hat back on. I hit the road for over 2,000 miles of riding long haul with a driver who tolerated me and my questions. I interviewed victims of sex trafficking who had been trafficked to truckers and survived violent encounters with truckers. I had to learn from the top two experts in the nation on street-level trafficking, two professors who do amazing work on the streets. And then I talked to the crime analysts. In fact, the woman who started the initiative was a crime analyst, not in the FBI, but in the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. Talk to all those people.

Speaker 2: 5:32

I would have to. As you're talking and I think you even alluded to it at one time we're talking about multi-jurisdictional crimes in many cases. In other words, for the average beat cop, say you know they find a body in an alley, there's a pretty good chance the crime occurred in the alley. That's where everything went down. They can coordinate it off and they'll investigate there. Am I correct in that when they do find a body, it's often nowhere near where the death occurred or where the initial abduction occurred?

Speaker 3: 6:15

You are spot on and that's a good contrast. You just laid out there the city. Cop who finds a body in the alley look and that's his crime scene. Okay. Cop who finds a body in the alley Look and that's his crime scene. Okay, we've got a mobile crime scene with an 18-wheeler big rig.

Speaker 3: 6:30

These truckers are exploiting the jurisdictional gaps in law enforcement. They're grabbing a victim in one jurisdiction, they're raping and murdering her in a second jurisdiction and they're dumping the body in a third. So you can see, and they're often six states, you know, six states away by the time anybody gets this, or they're back at home for months before a body is found. So the police have an incredible challenge to not only figure out who the body belongs, to put a name to that body, but also to figure out who did this. And it's a monumental investigative task. You know how long has the body been dead there? Well, you can bring somebody in who says, yeah, you know forensics. We think it's been here for three months.

Speaker 3: 7:15

Okay, three months worth of tracking truckers. Who what passed through the nearest weigh station. Or do you want gas receipts from every trucking company in America that had someone pass through that highway? Do you want weigh station scale receipts for 300 companies that maybe had truckers drive through there in the last three months. It's monumental. Companies that may be head trunkers drive through there in the last three months. It's monumental. And add to that the fact that these victims, often their family members, don't even know they're missing, let alone dead, so you don't have someone at the police station pounding their fist on the desk demanding answers. Long ago, many of these families distanced themselves for survival mechanisms and said I can't take it anymore. My daughter, my sister, I keep bailing her out. We now have custody of her infant baby. She passes out at the table when she comes home. How many times can we do this? They distance themselves. No one's championing their cause.

Speaker 2: 8:23

So it could literally be, in some cases years after the crime occurred, before anybody.

Speaker 3: 8:32

Decades. I've got cases in the book 30 years before they figure out who the body is, let alone who did it.

Speaker 2: 8:43

Wow yeah, and I'm guessing too back to the kind of the multi-j, let alone who did it? Wow yeah, and I'm guessing too, back to the kind of the multi-jurisdictional thing. I'm guessing that on situations like this the FBI or somebody from the federal level you know they don't come in immediately on these things so initially you're going to have some local law enforcement, perhaps a sheriff of that county, who traditionally will investigate kind of right up to the edges of the area that they are responsible for, and so they may only be focused on one aspect of the crime, not even realizing that there are additional aspects of the crime. Is that safe?

Speaker 3: 9:34

Yeah for sure, jack. They don't even know of the existence of the FBI's Highway Zero Killings Initiative and the special database that's been created, been in place for years that if they'll simply enter their data in, if that light bulb will go on and somebody will say some detective will say wait a minute. I think I heard about this in training. This may not be a local murder, this could be a trucker. I need to get all of my crime scene data into the FBI's database so that the analysts back at Quantico, the algorithms in the database, can start their work and say all of what you're telling us about your crime scene and your victim and I mean my nude questions, like 200 questions that they have to answer for this to work well Like tell us about your victim Hair color, height, weight.

Speaker 3: 10:31

Was she nude at the time of her discovery? Half nude, which half? Was she mutilated? Was she stabbed, shot or strangled? Was she, you know cause of death? What position was her body? Was she mutilated? Was her hair cut? I mean eye color? And yes, then the computer can say and the analyst can say wait a minute, we see, send us photos of that knot that was used. Was it a rope or was it her clothing that was torn to gag her or strangle her?

Speaker 3: 11:03

All of that makes sense back at the FBI because they can then say we've seen this before, we've seen this three years ago halfway across the country and you've got a serial killer here. And yet so many of these departments will tell you, look, we're a county sheriff, we don't even have detectives, let alone a crime analyst. You want us filling out 200, answering 200 questions about a database we seldom hear about, or a big city department, if this happens somehow in a city jurisdiction along the highway saying we're just really busy. You know we had 100 homicides this year. No one's screaming about this young lady being dead and you know we'll get to it when we can. All of that is problematic for obvious reasons.

Speaker 2: 11:51

You know, frank, one of the things I often think of, for example, on a local level investigation, and, like you said, sometimes it just comes down to the they say you know we're too busy. One thing I always keep in mind, and not just with law enforcement, but people in a wide variety of service public service type jobs. Just like everybody else, they have concerns about whether they're going to be able to get this bill paid this month or is the interest rate on their home going to go up. In other words, they have a similar level of stress and distractions to everybody else in the world. So, as much as we would like to think that the focus during those eight to 12 hours on duty is just laser, pointed in on this one thing I know that's not true of myself, and I know that's not true of myself, and I know that's not true of people at large. So when you factor in a department that's overwhelmed, does it sometimes just come down to? You know we'll get to it if we can.

Speaker 3: 13:17

Yeah, you know, it's just a sad reality that the squeaky wheel does get the griefs in law enforcement. So if there's intense media pressure, if there is a family demanding answers, then it's going to get higher up in the pile of priorities. But otherwise, often, once they determine this young woman was involved in trafficking, you know, it just kind of descends in the pile of priorities. This is why the FBI's behavioral analysis folks are also in the marketing business. They have to. You know. It's just not a passive initiative. Oh, fill out your form, put it in the commuter and we'll help. Oh, fill out your form, put it in the commuter and we'll help. No, they get out there across America and they preach this gospel of fill out your forms. Here's what we can do for you. Do you need our help? Do you need grant money? Do you need an analyst? Can we help you fill out the forms? They preach that gospel so that that detective who's not focused that particular day and has a hundred other things going on in his life can go. Ok, hold on a minute. Six months ago I went to that in-service training and I heard about the FBI program. I'm going to fill out the form, you know, or at least pick up the phone, call your local FBI office. That's one of my hopes with this book.

Speaker 3: 14:40

I have many metrics by which this book could be successful, and it's not just about sales. It's about the scenario where maybe a law enforcement officer or law enforcement executive reads the book, hears about it and says you know what, we are entering our cases. We have cases like that and I need to get them entered. Number one, number two maybe a victim family who now believes their victim was killed by a trucker now goes to their police department and demands that that department enter their data in the FBI's database. Maybe you know really good a victim or soon-to-be victim of the trap of trafficking reads the book, hears the audible version, someone hands it to her and she says you know what I'm, alex, I cannot allow this to keep going on in my life. I am being trafficked and the light bulb has just gone on. I'm being trafficked and the light bulb has just gone on. That's you know. Those are the things that if one of those things happens in one case, then I'll be successful.

Speaker 2: 15:56

You touched on something there that really jumped out at me, but it made sense as soon as I heard it.

Speaker 3: 16:06

Are you saying that there are people who are being trafficked that might not be aware that they are being trafficked? Yes, thanks for going back to that, because in my book I quote from Polaris arguably the largest, most effective global anti-trafficking organization in the world and their studies and research have been so helpful for me in my research. And they say, absolutely, if you were to ask many young people who are selling sex for money, are you a trafficking victim? They might say well, I mean, I'm doing this with my boyfriend. You know we've got a drug habit and you know he has me out on the street because that's how we get our money for our drugs and he loves me and I think maybe he'll stop loving me if I don't do this. And you know there's a bunch of guys that that kind of get the money that I make and you know well, hello, you're being trafficked.

Speaker 3: 17:06

And I think in society we watch too much TV and movies where some kid is grabbed off the sidewalk, thrown in the back of a van and trafficked around the world. And I'm not saying that that doesn't happen, but I am telling you what is far more common is that the trafficked victim is recruited and groomed slowly over time by someone in her network of friends, acquaintances, even remote family members, and it's too late before they realize. My God, I have been exploited here and you know it's a wake up call for lots of people, particularly those who think well and I had to throw out my biases when I started doing this because you think there's only a certain type of people, maybe from this kind of family, that end up trafficked and my God you're talking about drug use and sex for money.

Speaker 3: 17:58

Come on and then you realize when you start talking to these victims. I talked to one who was a preacher's daughter. I talked to another one from the Midwest who went to college, very bright woman, and you go. Okay, I'm wrong. I'm wrong, but the professors and the experts told me look for the commonalities. As different as these women victims might be, you're going to start checking the boxes in your head of seeing the commonalities that we've. It's early exposure to drug use, often starting with marijuana and then ramping up to hard drugs. From there it's a series of bad boyfriends often that really manipulate and exploit, and here comes the hard drugs, and now judgment's out the window and suddenly you've got this pimp-slash-boyfriend relationship. That's very kind, very kind.

Speaker 2: 19:08

I have to assume and it is an assumption because I don't know this, so I'm looking to you for the answer I have to assume that, even though a lot of these serial killers might not have gone far in their educational path, that a great majority of them are above average intelligence. Would that?

Speaker 3: 19:35

be. You know, every serial killer has been studied every which way from Sunday and the answer is they're not all the same and they're varying degrees of IQ. But here's where the connection comes, I think, to smartness or not, and that's the length of time they go without getting caught. So the sloppy ones, you know, might get get two, three killings under their belt, but they're so sloppy and thoughtless that they're gonna get caught. They screw up easily. Um, you know. And on the other end of the spectrum, we keep.

Speaker 3: 20:12

I think we've been been inundated with people like ted bundy. All the tv series about bundy, oh, he was charming and he was brilliant. And yeah, okay, yeah, all right. But that is an aberration. Most of serial killers tend to be antisocial, almost hermit-like in their lifestyle. They don't have a love for people in any way, shape or form. They, particularly in the case of these trucker killers, seem to have great animosity toward women. And some of that research is fascinating because you often get back to childhood and an abusive situation in their homes, and an abusive situation in their homes, sometimes at the hands of either an abusive and or absent mother, so that it's quite likely that the resentment and anger towards the female figure in their life is eventually projected onto their victims. I think that has a lot to do with it. So, smart, yeah, I mean.

Speaker 3: 21:17

Look, we look at people like Robert Ben Rhodes, who I opened my book up with, perhaps the most notorious trucker killer, good for 50 victims 50, 5-0, over years years. He's not getting caught. Now one way to look at that is yeah, that's the challenge of a killer who's on the highway Everywhere at once yes, but also kind of a killer who's on the highway everywhere at once, yes, but also kind of knows what he's doing yeah, and it's interesting, they do reach a saturation point, I think, where they kind of give up. They're kind of like I am going to call, I can't stop myself, I'm going to get caught.

Speaker 3: 22:08

The example of that in the book would be Bruce Mendenhall who finally, when approached by a really smart detective in Nashville at a truck stop, the detective had his eye on Mendenhall as a possible suspect in killings in the Nashville area and was watching him. One day at a truck stop in Nashville he walks up to Mendenhall who's sitting in his rig, and he says to Mendenhall are you the guy we're interested in? And Mendenhall just shrugs his shoulders and says I do say so. And you know, that's kind of like yeah, I've had it, I've had it. And of course, the search of that rig determined that there were hand-thrust latex gloves, sex toys, a rifle, duct tape and a bag full of bloody laundry with the DNA of five different women in it.

Speaker 2: 22:51

Holy cow, frank. I don't know that there would be any research on this question, so if not, then just kind of. I guess I'm asking from your gut Do you have any idea what percentage of people go to becoming a long-haul trucker because they know the opportunity it presents, versus the people who become a long-haul trucker because they know the opportunity it presents, versus the people who become a long haul trucker and then go ah, this presents an opportunity.

Speaker 3: 23:30

Great, great question. I'm getting asked this question a lot. I had to ask the question in this book and it's in part the nature or nurture question, the age old, you know how, what came first, chicken or the egg? What makes a serial killer? And you know it's not binary. The answer is it's a bit of both. But and I'll you know just briefly, most studies and research over the years show that there's a combination of nature and environment that makes a serial killer. By that I mean it could start in the womb, it could start with brain malfunction, bad brain chemistry, dna, the synapses aren't all firing correctly, the absence of a certain chemical in the brain, or too much of a certain chemical in the brain, or both much of a certain chemical in the brain or both, plus some kind of really bad upbringing, something that impacted that young person, often abuse, sometimes not, but you know that's so critical here.

Speaker 3: 24:34

Now your question is related to that, which is okay. You take that person and there's a predisposition to violence, and do they deliberately choose the path of long-haul trucker? I say very, very rarely. Here's my thought on that. First, we know that long-haul trucking is the number one profession of serial killers. Nothing's even close, wow, number one. So with that you could say well, there it is. Um, they must choose the profession. I think they choose the profession not to necessarily kill or with the intention of killing, but rather it fits their personality it is anti.

Speaker 3: 25:15

It's anti-social. Um, you can choose a type of trucking, like dry van, just delivering dry goods across the country. No physical or mental engagement with your load. I rode a flambed which has a ton of physical and mental engagement. You have to know math and physics.

Speaker 3: 25:33

Weight distribution, federally mandated points of securement for your specific load. Do I chain this load? And so how many change? Or do I strap the load? How do I tarp it correctly so it's totally covered? Am I going to be able to fill up all three of my gas tanks today or will that put me overweight with this load? Is the load really 47,000 pounds or are they cheating? You know all of that's going on in your head. Plus, you're getting that physical workout, for example, a rolled up tarp. One of them is 100 pounds and I'm hoisting this 100-pound dead weight up onto the trailer and then we get it up on top of the load and drape it properly and position it properly to cover the load. All of that going on.

Speaker 3: 26:16

If you're doing chaining, the chains are extremely heavy. I mean, you've got these thick braided chains over your shoulder. You're getting really dirty in these oily chains and you're you know you're chaining a suicide coil, as we did, which is a heavy roll of rolled steel and it's called a suicide coil because if you don't chain it and secure it properly it can go right through your cab and kill you or, worse, roll off the back of your trailer and kill someone in a car behind you. A lot going on and you know probably not the attraction for that isolated hermit character that prefers to be alone. But then that person we're talking about, I think the light bulb goes on after they're in the profession and they realize I could get away with almost anything and in this case they do Right.

Speaker 2: 27:12

And as you are telling me about all of the duties and the hard work associated with that flatbed driver, I was just kind of contrasting in my head. So when I and we can go more into this but when I think about the physical work required to keep someone captive, you know, the potential is there and I've got to think okay, if I'm 300 plus pounds, out of shape, eat a horrible diet, get winded when I walk from the cab to the restaurant, I'm probably not a guy, even if it's an inclination I have that's going to want to have to do all that hard work. But if I'm a guy who drives a flatbed truck, I stay in pretty good shape. I can lift heavy loads. I've got that work mentality. Plus I can calculate and plan and be strategic about things. About things, yeah, when you compare the two, one seems, at least to me, far more likely than the other.

Speaker 3: 28:28

So I like the way you're thinking, yeah, I like the way you're thinking through this, jack, because that's the kind of thought process that I went through and you know, that's the kind of thought processes that the crime analysts are going through back at the FBI and one of the things you know not to have a spoiler alert here, but I will tell you just when I came close to saying, okay, this is it, I got it. I think it's the dry banners, mostly, you know, and I think it's probably less likely to be a corporate driver because they're so heavily tracked through technology. Well then I'd find cases that are the exception. We're a corporate driver who's heavily tracked and logged GPS. The company knows where they are every time. He'd park his truck at a truck stop for his federally mandated downtime. Then he'd go on an Uber or a rental car and he'd park his truck at a truck stop for his federally mandated downtime and then go in an Uber or a rental car and kill somebody. With regard to your theory, you make a good case for the physical dexterity or ability to subdue and abduct somebody, but again, for me, I think there are always exceptions, but I think it is that dry banner. Who is obsessing has all the time in the world to obsess, and all of that.

Speaker 3: 29:45

Yes, if I'm assigned 450 suspects, I'm going to narrow it down. You better believe it. And that was part of my process in the book. I just naturally had to winnow this thing down. And you know, would I look at corporate drivers first? No, I would not. Would I look at 300-pound fat out look at corporate drivers first? No, I would not. Would I look at 300 pound fat out of shape guys? No, probably not. So that's helpful. But with regard to a saying well, flag bettors are so physical and smart, it's probably them. I think not. I think not. They're too engaged, they've got things to do, places to be, lots of work, and time is money for them. It's very different than the dry banners. But again, I'll guarantee you, just as soon as you get close to a theory, you'll find the exception to that theory.

Speaker 2: 30:37

And here's what's fascinating to me as you're going through that You're a retired FBI agent, assistant director for counterintelligence. You know your craft, you were very good at your craft, and yet I see you work through that algorithm and I see your mind, as you're doing so, kind of going like this because even for a guy like you, there is no hard and fast rule that says that guy, if we yeah, I mean you can see how difficult and challenging this is and why the FBI's help is needed here, because if it were easy, this initiative wouldn't have to still be in existence since 2004,.

Speaker 3: 31:35

Jack, I mean 2004, jack, I mean 2004,. And they haven't figured out some kind of formula to this. They're still genuinely flummoxed and have results. Now it's all going back to the crime scene and have the victimology study they call it victimology where the dead victim can actually speak and say, through that crime scene, this is who killed me. Similarly, the methodology of the killer very important.

Speaker 3: 32:05

But yes, if you get in the weeds and start, you've got some suspects in a particular case and you have certain commonalities. Just like I told you, the victims have certain commonalities to look for that early childhood trauma, trauma stacked up in the family, abuse, boyfriend drugs. Ok, let's go now and try to narrow the suspects down, because I do ask about the victims which victim in which kind of trafficking style is more likely to be killed, is more likely to be killed? I get deep into that and we could go there. You know, with regards to what I learned about the different work styles of traffic victims, there are pimp control and there are two kinds of pimp control. You know there's a guerrilla pimp and there's a finesse pimp. There is something called a woman, or anyone boy or trans, who's called a renegade, that operates without a pimp, maybe with a butt, and maybe often leaves the pimp work style because they're fed up with the abuse and saying I can do this on my own and pocket my money, right.

Speaker 3: 33:12

Or the third type, called an outlaw, that is net, that's never going to have sex for money, but rather is going to trick you and is going to rip you off. They're going to take your cash, um, and you might say, hearing that, oh well, okay, the trafficking victim more likely to be killed is the outlaw. She's pissing off a trucker, um, and, and taking his wallet. No, not really, because what's going to happen there? Is that guy going to report to the police that he got robbed? Is he going to be able to kill her? She's highly skilled at escaping that truck or that hotel room with that cash. She's done this before. She's got a helper. So you get into that, just as I did it with truckers, and so I did ask the question which kind of trucker is more likely to kill? And I have theories.

Speaker 2: 34:03

Like I said, what did you find, if anything, about the willingness to accept some responsibility by the truck lines themselves or the trucking industry?

Speaker 3: 34:18

Yeah, and before we jump on that, let me finish the thought on it, because I barely answered your question about.

Speaker 3: 34:25

You know, I was starting to bring up commonalities. Just like with the victims, there are commonalities with the truckers and some of this came straight from women I interviewed who were victims and survived. Alcohol abuse is huge for the women who tell me they're more afraid of an alcoholic trucker than they are a trucker using drugs and the use of drugs even with the victim is very common, by the way but they tell me it's the alcoholic who becomes violent and abusive. And then, even if they quote unquote, have regulars who are truckers. If they start hearing the personal story of I can't stay in a relationship. Women are bitches to me. You know my ex-wife said blah blah, blah, blah. Uh, my mom beat me.

Speaker 3: 35:25

Okay now. Now you've got a problem on your hands, right, um, and they, their spidey sense will will kick into gear. The problem with the spidey sense is they're high on drugs themselves most of the time that they're doing that transaction, so their judgment flies out the window. You know there's one victim I learned about, who you know apparently thought it was a good idea to let the guy duct tape her legs. You know well, she was high she. You know in in retrospect she got out by the skin of her teeth or she would be dead. But you go, that's really stupid. And then you realize I'm really high, so you know it's a problem there. But now let's switch gears. Um you, you had asked a new question gosh, I'm gonna have to.

Speaker 2: 36:17

I'm gonna ask a different one until I get back on track with that one and remember what it was. Do you find that once somebody has been, for lack of better words, abducted whether they realize they have or not, whether lured in, however it happens yeah, if they are kept for any length of time, do you find any kind of like Stockholm syndrome kind of starting to factor in?

Speaker 3: 36:49

It starts early, because if you've got the right young person that you're you grabbed on to, there's a lack. They're lacking something in their lives that often the pimp or the boyfriend slash, groomer, pimp is satisfying for them. So this becomes even an abusive relationship, which is very common. Now we seem to associate abuse with the only kind of affection. I know I have no human touch, except when I get beaten or raped by my pet. And guess what? When the police arrest me for traffic, for prostitution, guess who comes and bails me out? My pet, not my family. So, yes, stockholm Syndrome kicks in and you think I can't get out. They've got my. This is very common.

Speaker 3: 37:41

They take your ID, your Social Security card, your driver's license, your phone. They own you. So go ahead. You know some people will tell their women in their stable it's called a stable Go ahead, knock yourselves out. Where are you going to go? Where are you going to buy your drugs? I give you your drugs. How are you going to feed yourself? So yes, absolutely.

Speaker 3: 38:04

This is why the partnership I talk about in the book between the police and social service organizations is so critical, and it is working in many cities, including Phoenix and Toledo and Las Vegas, where the police will partner with the social service organizations and, instead of slapping handcuffs on a trafficking victim, they'll say we're not arresting you tonight. What do you need to get out from under this trap you're in Because I have a social services partner here. Well, I got to get away from my pimp. I need a place to sleep. We have that for you. We have it. Okay, I need diapers for my infant baby. We have that. Well, someday I'd like to be a hair cutter or paralegal. I need a certificate training. We have people in the community who are going to front the bill for that, so that system works.

Speaker 3: 38:56

And then, from a law enforcement perspective, I've seen this work. By the way, when I was special agent in charge in northern Ohio, I saw it working in Toledo, a major hub of trafficking, by the way, because of the intersection of highways, buses and trains and proximity to Detroit. I saw this work where, eventually, the trust now is developed between the victim, the social worker and the police detective. So eventually that victim says I will now tell you who my pimp was, how big the operation is and the stories that come out of that. We had stories out of Toledo, ohio, nationwide trafficking organizations that we took down because of that trust that we developed, even organizations that would take their stable, their victims, from Ohio and get them to the Super Bowl or National Political Convention and traffic them there, particularly underage women.

Speaker 2: 39:56

Wow, as you're saying that, I'm thinking you know what, if I'm homeless or near homeless and I'm hitchhiking, one of the places that's going to appeal to me is just as you described in Toledo, where a lot of places intersect highways, trains there's a lot of opportunity there to get a ride for one. So if I put on the serial killer hat, then I'm looking at that, saying there will be more people than usual in this location needing rides or looking for rides. So is that kind of like a fly trap?

Speaker 3: 40:40

so to speak Absolutely. And if you think this doesn't happen in my city, but you've got intersections of major highways, major train routes and bus stations, you have trafficking and the truckers know that and, yes, it's a target of opportunity, is what the analysts are telling you. You'll have a target-rich environment for that trucker in that area. They know it. And yes, in Toledo there have been serial killer cases that I've studied where indeed it was like grabbing fish in a barrel, so to speak.

Speaker 2: 41:16

Indeed, it was like grabbing fish in a barrel, so to speak. Right, yeah, it's interesting because about 10 years ago I lived in Springfield, missouri, and there's so much meth there. At the time and I don't think it's changed that meth was called 417, which was the area code for that area, and I was at a gas pump one day and a a deputy pulled up and I'm just talking to him and I asked him approximately how many stops that you make are meth-related and I was blown away. He said one out of three. One out of three. And then I asked him the next question was what makes this area of the state so rife with meth? One answer Interstate 44 and Interstate 65 cross right there Two major moving drugs in and out. That was it.

Speaker 3: 42:12

Think about it. If it works for the trucking industry, it works for drug traffickers, right? It's the same route and the state patrol officers in those states, like Ohio, like Missouri, they know it. They pull cars over all the time and they can sense they've got a car with dope in it. So, yeah, and the use of meth as a control mechanism over the women by the pimps? Absolutely yeah, I keep you supplied and you keep making money for me, but you know we come down to this. We're having this discussion, Jack, in an environment right now where we still have politicians of a certain ilk calling to defund the FBI, of a certain ilk calling to defund the FBI, Right. And my question to them is I know a lot of this is posturing and I know it's because the FBI is investigating them or their cohort.

Speaker 3: 43:05

But what part of the FBI do you want to defund? Exactly the part that's investigating corrupt Republicans, corrupt Democrats. Because, by the way, as we speak, there are serious corruption investigations going on right now in the FBI on both parties. Right, we've got Senator Menendez. There's a Texan Democratic Congressman, quaylar is under investigation. So please don't tell me that you don't like the FBI because they focus on one party. Is it the part of the FBI that works the Highway Serial, highway Zero Killings Initiative? You want them cut off of funding, because right now, the FBI budget is $500 million under what the FBI says they need to do their mission. Which part of the FBI do you want to defund? I hope not this one, but I hope not anyone.

Speaker 2: 43:56

Wow, that's mind-boggling. Let's go one step further with the mind-boggling and I'm asking you to kind of project and speculate a little bit. I know, but let's just take it to the extent that they say at least that they want to take it to. And, like you said, a lot of it is posturing. But let's just say they did defund the FBI, just defunded the FBI. Is there any way of even being able to get our arms around all of the societal devastation that one act would cause?

Speaker 3: 44:42

So there's even talk. You know, because there are some people out there going well, you can't technically defund the entire FBI. It exists in law and you know it's part of the executive branch. Well, right now, as we speak, there are people around Donald Trump saying that, yeah, you know what, we're going to move the FBI from outside the DOJ and the Attorney General and we're going to put it under the White House. So now, essentially, you've created a special police, a secret police, right?

Speaker 2: 45:12

the KGB.

Speaker 3: 45:14

Yeah, it's an FSB KGB. They do it in Russia, they do it in China and the history of it is pretty darn ugly, because you're actually talking about just just going after your enemies. So so what does that look like if you severely cut or defund the FBI? You know how that's going to look in an administration that doesn't adhere to the Constitution. It's going to look like only do what I tell you to do. And what does that look like?

Speaker 3: 45:39

The FBI is stretched extremely thin right now. They're telling us that they're buried in domestic terrorism issues. They're buried with Chinese cybercrime and hacking, russian and Iran and North Korea hacking. They've got spying. And look what happened in the last week. We learned that the FBI took down eight Tajikis from Tajikistan who have ISIS affiliation and who came across the southern border. The FBI did that. The FBI went to the Customs and Border Patrol and said, hey, hey, hey, you let these people in. By the way, they didn't sneak in. They went through CBP and had background checks that were clean. One of them even used the CBP One app to schedule an appointment for asylum claim, right?

Speaker 3: 46:31

So it was the FBI that apparently people want to defund that stopped a likely terrorist attack from happening. Is that the part of the FBI people want to defund that stopped a likely terrorist attack from happening. Is that a part of the FBI you want to defund? So if you're just doing one or two things you know, just do. If the president says, just do violent crime, that's it. I don't want to hear about corruption. I don't want to hear about Russia spying they're my friend. Well, you get what you ask for and we're likely to have the ball drop in a very big, disturbing way.

Speaker 2: 46:59

Right, one last question for you, frank, and I asked this question of you before we even started to recording and I asked the question. I said do you have any knowledge or crosstalk within the FBI now where there are people legitimately concerned about the defunding of the FBI?

Speaker 3: 47:26

And you told me yeah yeah, listen whenever chris ray, the director, is testifying before congress, because he's being very bold unusually bold for an fbi director in the threat level and how thinly they're stretched right now. Number one, number two when I do um, I talk to people in field offices who actually are where the rubber meets the road. It's in your local field office, right. They are inundated with threats, domestic threats, threats, threats against them, threats against judges, threats against election volunteers and officials, threats to the election and almost to the exception of everything else going on in that goddarn office. And so you have to ask yourself what is not being investigated right now? What about the violent gang? What about the drug distribution place near my school, my kid's school? What about civil rights?

Speaker 2: 48:29

What about bad cops? They're buried in threat right now and this comes right back to your book Somebody's missing. Comes right back to your book. Somebody's missing, but right now, in this pre-election run-up, where we've got active threats against judges, prosecutors, juries, when you have to decide, this is how many people we have out of this field office. Here are the investigations we've got. Here's the priority level of each and sorry, but this missing person we'll have to get to it later.

Speaker 3: 49:04

Exactly right. You know you have to decide whether you're for national security or not, whether you're for your neighborhood and communities being safe and secure or not. You're for the FBI supporting your local law enforcement in ways you don't even hear about, like this initiative but so many, many more, through task forces and grant money, and you've got to be reasonable about it. I don't care if you're on that side of the political aisle that says the FBI is overreached. I don't like this. Do you like the fact that the FBI is being attacked and can't do its job in your community? That's the question to ask.

Speaker 2: 49:42

Right, frank, thank you so much for writing this book that a lot of people didn't even know needed to be written, and I think that's an important thing. If nothing else, you're bringing the awareness of this, as you say, dark kind of corner of the world to light and then kind of giving a pathway, if you will, to learning about how to avoid it and everything that goes with that in terms of who the victims are, who the perpetrators are. So thank you so much for writing this book. Where can people get your book?

Speaker 3: 50:28

Yeah, it's been out now for three weeks and we are now, to my amazement, in our third printing in just three weeks. Pretty unusual. And you can grab it at anywhere you buy books Amazon, of course, but also Barnes, noble, of course, and Books A Million, but also, if you want to support your local independent bookstore, fantastic, get it there, just get it. It's also in audible fashion. I've read it myself. It took me three days to read it. I enjoyed that process. So do that. And if you're interested in more about this or just want to keep up with me, you can go to my website, frankfigluzzicom, and sign up for free for regular alerts. It has all my clips from TV, my appearances, my regular columns that I write for MSNBC Daily, and you can find me on social media, on Instagram and threads, and even X, until I can't tolerate it anymore.

Speaker 2: 51:25

Perfect, I hear you, frank. Thank you for being willing to come on and do a second episode on the Jack Hopkins Show podcast. I really appreciate it and and uh, more than anything I've, I've enjoyed getting to know you and Same here.

Speaker 3: 51:41

Same here, jeff. Thank you, I look forward to doing it anytime.

Speaker 2: 51:44

All right.

Speaker 3: 51:45

Thank you, Frank Take care.

Speaker 2: 51:46

Bye We'll see you next time.